sea, and I was particularly desirous to have viewed Isay; but the storms
did not permit us to launch a boat, and we were condemned to listen in
idleness to the wind, except when we were better engaged by listening to
the ladies.

We had here more wind than waves, and suffered the severity of a tempest,
without enjoying its magnificence. The sea being broken by the multitude
of islands, does not roar with so much noise, nor beat the shore with
such foamy violence, as I have remarked on the coast of Sussex. Though,
while I was in the Hebrides, the wind was extremely turbulent, I never
saw very high billows.

The country about Dunvegan is rough and barren. There are no trees,
except in the orchard, which is a low sheltered spot surrounded with a
wall.

When this house was intended to sustain a siege, a well was made in the
court, by boring the rock downwards, till water was found, which though
so near to the sea, I have not heard mentioned as brackish, though it has
some hardness, or other qualities, which make it less fit for use; and
the family is now better supplied from a stream, which runs by the rock,
from two pleasing waterfalls.

Here we saw some traces of former manners, and heard some standing
traditions. In the house is kept an ox's horn, hollowed so as to hold
perhaps two quarts, which the heir of Macleod was expected to swallow at
one draught, as a test of his manhood, before he was permitted to bear
arms, or could claim a seat among the men. It is held that the return of
the Laird to Dunvegan, after any considerable absence, produces a
plentiful capture of herrings; and that, if any woman crosses the water
to the opposite Island, the herrings will desert the coast. Boetius
tells the same of some other place. This tradition is not uniform. Some
hold that no woman may pass, and others that none may pass but a Macleod.

Among other guests, which the hospitality of Dunvegan brought to the
table, a visit was paid by the Laird and Lady of a small island south of
Sky, of which the proper name is Muack, which signifies swine. It is
commonly called Muck, which the proprietor not liking, has endeavoured,
without effect, to change to Monk. It is usual to call gentlemen in
Scotland by the name of their possessions, as Raasay, Bernera, Loch Buy,
a practice necessary in countries inhabited by clans, where all that live
in the same territory have one name, and must be therefore discriminated
by some additio